This technology relates to an input apparatus configured to operate a viewer, which is used to observe a medical image.
According to a browsing method in the past, a client viewer reads an image (tile image), which is divided into tiles and stored in an image server, based on a navigation operation instruction from a user. The client viewer displays the read image. A user merely selects a portion, which he wishes to browse. As a result, a system is capable of recognizing and displaying the corresponding tile image.
Further, for example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2006-519443 discloses the following technology. First, a client viewer requests for image data at a certain resolution. The image data is in a virtual slide image file. Next, a server system obtains a compressed block of image data, which includes image data of which resolution is close to the requested resolution. The server system sends the data block to the client. Next, the client zooms in/out the image data, and presents the image at the requested resolution.